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The Xbox One and Ps4 may be coming out this fall, but let's not forget about the Wii U. 's quixotic console is preparing to enter the second holiday season of its life, and Nintendo is dropping the price $50 accordingly. The Wii U deluxe edition now comes with an MSRP of $299.99, effective September 20th. The basic model is getting the axe.

It's been a difficult year for the Wii U. Not only did scores of gamers, and even respectable media outlets, not totally grasp the idea that it was a new console and not just an add on for the Wii, it's been plagued by a lack of software, flagging third-party support and a bold, if somewhat confusing, new control scheme. The Wii U's main controller is a touchscreen tablet, which is new, certainly. New enough that neither players nor developers have quite figured out what to do with it. Sales have been particularly weak.

In this light, a price-cut makes sense. Nintendo has some big, costly consoles to go up against this holiday season, and while it's arguably offering a very different and much less powerful product, it still helps to have that price advantage. The software challenge is finally starting to ease up as well -- Nintendo just released the highly fun Pikmin 3, and Ubisoft's Rayman Legends, while no longer a Wii U exclusive, is receiving rave reviews across the net. There are more Nintendo games in the pipeline.

Nintendo adheres to the old mantra: content is king. They are not hardware developers, nor software developers. They are both at the same time, and expect their in-house software to act as the main driver for their consoles. There is recent precedent for how well this can work. The 3Ds wasn't looking so hot this time last year, but a suite of new games turned it around and made the little handheld into a true success for the venerable company. We could still see the same thing happen with the Wii U, even if the Xbox One and PS4 will probably slow any comeback.

I just started playing Rayman: Legend with my girlfriend, and I'm starting to believe. In that game, I control the main platforming character while she uses the gamepad to move a helpful little sprite around. It's awesome. It's the sort of asymmetric multiplayer only made possible by the gamepad control scheme. a $50 price cut won't revitalize the system entirely, but I'm not ready to write off this strange little box yet.